The Vanishing Season (The Collector #4)(58)

Maybe it’s because we always pair laughter with gravitas, dragging one along with the other.

“Did I tell you I went to temple with my cousins for a while?” Priya asks after the atmosphere has shifted to that hush.

The girls nod, but we agents didn’t know.

“Mum and I thought moving to France, being that close to family again, maybe it was time to make the effort. To reconnect.” She taps a finger against the stud in her nose, the bindi between her eyes. “Feel like these meant more than just something I did with my mother and sister.”

“It doesn’t sound like it went well,” Mercedes notes.

“It isn’t mine. It’s the culture I was born to, but it isn’t mine, and it doesn’t feel . . .” She shakes her head, slumping down in her seat next to the stack of pizza boxes. “I wanted it to fit, or maybe I wanted to fit, but I didn’t belong. Instead, I just felt like a fraud for having these visible pieces of the culture without having any of the rest.”

“You still wear them.”

“They’re still mine. They were given to me by Mum, by Chavi, and even if they don’t have the cultural ties I wanted . . . it started for the three of us. It was ours. I don’t want to put aside yet another piece of Chavi.”

“How’d you stop feeling guilty?” Inara asks.

“I didn’t.”

Inara nods, but then we all understand living with guilt of one kind or another.

Mercedes pops the top off another cider. None of us are planning to get drunk, but two won’t hit anyone’s limits. “Ksenia met Siobhan a couple weeks ago.”

Cass sputters and chokes on a bit of crust until Victoria-Bliss reaches over and whacks her hard on her back. “They met?” she asks. “How?”

“Ksenia came to meet me for lunch, and Siobhan was heading out with some of her team. Everyone’s nightmare, right? The girlfriend and the ex meet. I just froze. It was so stupid, but all I could think for a moment was God, this is the moment when my job becomes too much again. This is when I start to lose her.”

“Ksenia’s not that easily scared off.”

“No, I know. I did say it was stupid. There were a lot of reasons Siobhan and I didn’t work, but right then, that second, I was blindingly afraid I was going to lose Ksenia, too, and I didn’t think my heart could take it.”

“And Ksenia said?”

“That I was being foolish, naturally. We’ve been together a little over a year, and I love her, but I keep waiting for it to go wrong.”

“Yeah, that feeling lingers,” I mutter.

Mercedes toasts me with her bottle.

“I got a letter that was addressed to the restaurant,” Inara offers, staring into the flames. “It was from my father.”

Mercedes looks up, startled. “Your father?”

“I haven’t seen him since I was eight years old. After he and my mother divorced, neither of them wanted me, so they shoved me off on my grandmother and forgot all about me. And now, suddenly, a letter. Says he heard my name on television, and when he saw a picture, he thought it must be me. I look a lot like my mother used to.” Her tone is so very, very carefully neutral, which makes me think the letter probably mentioned that, and not necessarily in a flattering way. “Says he’s been so worried about me for all the years I’ve been missing. He wants us to be a family again.”

Victoria-Bliss snorts derisively. “You were never a family. And even if he was worried at one point, that bastard waited seven years from when we were splashed all over the news.”

Inara’s lips quirk in something that’s almost a smile. “He never was any good with money.”

“You think he’s going to ask you for money?” asks Cass, who knows the girls the least.

“No, I think he wants to connect so he can sell a good story to anyone who’ll pay him for it. Get a few pictures together, maybe, to up the price. I shredded the letter. I doubt he’s going to come visit if I don’t respond. I just . . .” She blows out a sharp breath. “When I was a kid, I was so desperate for my parents to love me. I honestly came to accept that they didn’t, and I was fine. Better than fine, I was good. And now he comes trying to trick me for money, and he can’t even be bothered to pretend to love me in the letter. I’ve written form letters with more warmth and feeling. I just look back at myself as a little girl and wonder why the hell I thought it would matter.”

“Because it does matter,” I answer. “Even once we accept they don’t love us, it does matter, because they made us feel like we were wrong to want it.”

Priya and Mercedes both give me considering looks.

“What about you, Victoria-Bliss?” prompts Cass. “Has anyone been harassing you? Your family?”

“The folks and I are basically at Christmas and birthday-card levels,” she says, unashamed. Her fair skin nearly glows in the darkness and the flickering firelight, and I wonder if that’s how she looked the night the Garden went up in flames. “And, you know, I’m good with that. Every now and then my therapist makes some noise about dating, or being less angry, but I’m happy like this. I don’t want to date. Ever. Wasn’t particularly interested in it before I was kidnapped either. I don’t want to ‘let go of my anger’ or whatever fucking bullshit; I like being angry. It’s not just getting by, I enjoy what I have. I’m a little sick of people telling me it’s not enough.”